SHINEDOWN's BRENT SMITH On Touring Europe After Terrorist Attacks: 'You Can't Live Your Life In Fear'

SHINEDOWN singer Brent Smith was recently interviewed by the 95.1 WIIL Rock radio station in Kenosha, Wisconsin. You can now listen to the chat using the SoundCloud widget below. A couple of excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On whether he is nervous to tour Europe due to terrorism concerns:

Brent: "No, man, I'm not nervous or anything. Neither are my guys, or my girls — you know, our staff and our crew and everything. I mean, this is what we do for a living; this is part of who we are.

"I have to be aware of what's going on at all times, no matter if I'm in another country or if I'm my own country. I remember back in 2005, man, we went to Iraq and played for the soldiers with the USO. We went to Fort Buehring in Kuwait. We went to Iraq at kind of the height when they were still throwing missiles back and forth at each other. I mean, that whole tour that we did over there, I was wearing a bulletproof vest and really didn't think anything about it, because I was there to play for our soldiers.

"I think you have to show that you're not going to allow someone to dictate your fear. And what I mean by that is you have to live your life; you can't live your life in fear. And that's what these individuals want you to do; they want you to be in fear. And there's no reasoning for that. They're cowards — point blank. They send people into buildings to kill themselves and to kill other people because they're cowards, and you've gotta fight 'em."

On whether SHINEDOWN has any new music in the works:

Brent: "[In] September we're gonna go into the studio for just an open…we call it an 'open mic,' which means we all get in the studio when we have time and we just kind of see where everybody's at and what ideas are starting to come up. That's the only real break we have. After [the] 'Carnival Of Madness' tour, we have about ten days left of… well, a little less than ten days of August left after we finish the last date of 'Carnival Of Madness', and then we go into September, and then we go to South America for the first time, and then we get back. So right around the 10th of September through the end of that month, we have that open, so we're gonna go in the studio and start seeing what everybody's got. As far as new material actually finished, nothing right now, just because we have an insanely booked year. But in September we're gonna take a look and see what's percolating in everybody's brain."

SHINEDOWN's fifth studio album, "Threat To Survival", debuted at No. 6 on The Billboard 200 album chart, selling 65,000 copies in its first week of release.

"Threat To Survival" was the third SHINEDOWN album to enter the chart in the Top 10, following "Amaryllis" and 2008's "The Sound Of Madness", which debuted at No. 8.